Author: Snoskred

Half of it I can’t talk about here, and the other half I haven’t had the time or energy to talk about here. So let us go back in time to Christmas Day. After just one year of hosting Christmas, The Other Half and I have this down to a fine art and really do not need to do much food preparation at all, just putting out nibblies, cooking a BBQ with steaks and sausages, and Mother provides the dessert of Pavlova.

Only this year I had gone on a Christmas Shopping expedition to The Treat Factory and found out they were making gelato logs. What a fantastic idea. I ordered one in dark chocolate and salted caramel. It was fabulous and we had leftovers which we have greatly enjoyed on all the hot evenings since.

I did mostly forget to take photos, we were having too good a time really. It was lovely to be still and enjoy each others company. However I knew it was back to work the next morning, so it was a little less relaxing than usual.

I worked on Boxing Day, not a long shift. I gave a Christmas present to a fellow co-worker and they told me it was the only present they had to open on Christmas Morning, which also made me a little sad – but extra happy I went to the effort to get something for them. I remember many years of having nothing to open, which is why I go to an extra effort now to make sure I do have things to open even if I bought them for myself.

I haven’t had a chance to write up the No Spend for both November and December – and not sure there is much point now we’re in a new year other than for the sake of completion. December was a spend month but mostly spending on presents for other people. I did have two things I wanted to buy in the Boxing Day Sales – Bras and Kiehl’s Moisturiser in the super large size.

I’ve worn the same 4 bras to work for 6 months now – these were the same 4 bras I’d been wearing for almost a year already – and while they are still semi-wearable, they were past their use-by date. I figured it would be a good idea to pick some up if they were on special. I’d bookmarked them in my browser. I hoped to buy them on super special on Boxing Day, but none of them moved in price at all, at least not online.

That is a really smart thing on the part of Bras N Things, to have an inhouse brand which you fit customers in and sell them but don’t ever discount, not even on the biggest sale day of the year. I thought maybe they might be on special in store or maybe there might be something else I could try on which was on special, so I suggested to The Other Half that he drop me off at the shops and I would go for a wander. I thought he wouldn’t want to go. Surprise, he did join me! Because it was mid-afternoon, the sales rush was over and we even managed to find a decent park.

There was a shopping incident where I thoroughly spoiled myself with new bras. I tried one on and it was so comfortable I gave it to the sales assistant and said “please can you go and find every bra like this in my size, I will take them all” – she found 7 in my size. Perfect! One for each day of the week, and I got two navy blue polkadot ones which I have officially allocated as work bras.

A few days later another family member needed bras so we went together and they had more in my size back out on the shelves – I bought 5 more because they were so comfortable and even cheaper on sale than they were the first time, because they added “spend $100 get $20 off” on top of the great sale prices and I had two $5 vouchers as well – one of which I gave to my family member..

I had not bought any bras at all since mid 2017 after my big weight loss, so I think I did pretty well. I wish I’d done it sooner because I did not realise how uncomfortable the old ones had become, and I got to a point where the minute I got in the house I would take them off – not anymore, now I am enjoying wearing these all day long, the same way I once did with the old bras.

I got my Kiehls for 15% off. Sometimes it is really handy to have signed up for the mailing list, as I was able to go back through the emails since September and realised 15% off is the best deal they’ve done in those three months. I still have 1/3 of the jar left from my Canberra shopping trip.

This new jar is 3x the size so I should get 9 months out of it at least. I’ve maybe missed two mornings since I bought it and on those missed days I can really tell that I missed applying it. I’m so glad I found this moisturiser and have to send another big thanks to Sydney Shop Girl for making me aware of this brand.

I bought a few things from my TVSN wishlist for crazy discounted prices, including this one I mentioned in my April did not buy post for $9.95 instead of $64.95, what a bargain! The material is so gorgeous. I’m glad they had it left in my size, I was not so lucky with some of the other items I wanted.

In other family news, my cousin and his wife have arrived for a long-ish visit. They are replacing a couple of staff on my parents side of the store, who had two staff members resign leading up to Christmas. Not sure if this will be temporary or long term. I’d not met his wife before but it turns out we are like twinsies and get along super well, plus she loves to walk which is great for me.

In blog news, at this stage I am not sure if and when I will return to regular posting. A few things are up in the air at work right now, and I’m waiting for things to settle before making any big decisions. I’ll try and get in one post a week but I’m just not making any promises because I don’t know my future schedule.

That about sums up how I am feeling today, less than 5 hours after I completed what I have secretly nicknamed “The Santa Obstacle Course 2018”.

When I realised I had finished it, a huge weight lifted from my shoulders, and I felt like dancing. But I still had two hours more work to do, stocktaking our little area, tidying up because my offsider is a bit of a hurricane at times and also forgets to put things back where they live, cleaning, sorting, fixing.

After that I caught a lift home, made coffee, cleaned some in preparation for tomorrow – we are hosting Christmas – snuck out for a quick take away dinner, had afternoon coffee at the late hour of 7pm, cleaned a little more, and I still have a bit more cleaning to do.

I had no idea it was possible to be this tired. I’m ready for sleep already. It isn’t physically tired, though there is some of that. I’ve been getting my 10000 steps every single work day these past weeks. I’ve actually kicked the chair out of my area because I don’t have time to sit and I don’t have room for the chair.

It is 90% mentally tired and part of it is Aspie tired. You see, usually at any given time in my job, I might have 20-50 items with various names on them, waiting for the customer to pick them up. All of that is mentally catalogued via my Aspie Super Powers, filed away neatly in my brain. When the customer arrives, I ask for the surname, and it takes me mere moments for my mental file system to tell me exactly where that item is.

Over the past 5 weeks, I have had double to triple the amount of items with various names on them. I’ve also had 200 or so extra items with names each week to catalogue. I’m not the only person working there, either. I’ve had to create “maps” of where everything is, so the other folks can find things fast when they need to. That plan seems to have worked really well.

I did get my Christmas Glitter Nails, and promptly forgot to take any photos. Here they are two weeks in. You can’t see the rainbow holographic glitter on the thumbnail but believe me it is there. I’ve been loving these nails, even though they are “mismatched” and somewhat weird to some folks. My nail lady thought I was cuckoo, she is probably right. ;)

I wish you all the compliments of the season and hope you have a lovely Christmas day filled with whatever floats your boat. I’ll try to remember to take some photos to share with you this year. :)

This year I needed to have Christmas themed nails for several weeks. Being an assistant to the Jolly Man In The Red Velvet Suit comes with a special set of expectations, even if they are only in my mind and not enforced by anyone specific. I got matching toes but my toes are never seen at work, so that was just for me. ;)

Christmas Earrings, Christmas T-shirts, a good Christmas “stocking cap”, and Christmas Nails have been my work uniform recently. This sequinned version from Spotlight was not the one I chose but it was up there in the top three options.

My first set of Christmas Nails were done on November the 21st. This is exactly what I saw in my mind though the gold line might have been more solid gold. I asked her to exaggerate the tips, make them larger/taller than usual because I knew it would be 3 weeks before I could go back. My second set I’m thinking will have 5 different shades of glitter – green, gold, red, silver, and sparkly white like snow.

If these nails could talk, the stories they would tell you of the past few weeks! The checklists of “things that must be done before Santa sits in the chair”. The time I missed one of the vital steps and thus set off the fire alarm as a surprise to everyone. You can bet I’ll not make that mistake a second time.

The screaming children. The happy children. The screaming parents. The happy parents. The levels of skill of our photographer who is able with just a few words to get children to sit up straight and smile. You can visibly see them follow his instructions, and every single time it amazes me.

The outfits worn by families to see Santa are generally of a sparkly, sequin covered and often tulle-skirted nature. I wanted a tulle skirt for me. I did nearly buy this tutu, also from Spotlight, but decided it would be a step too far. Three weeks in, I actually think I was wrong on this particular call. It would have fit right in. Anything you can do to get smiles out of the folks or divert the attention of a crying child is worth ten times the $$$ you pay for it. Next year, especially if I can snag it on clearance prices after Christmas.

That is why this toy was an incredible godsend. I am not hip to the latest in toys, it has been a few years since I needed to buy any, but the how to survive Santa info pack was clear – get a toy that makes noise so the photographer can get the attention of the younger ones and they will look towards the camera. When you squeeze the head of this toy, it makes a loud funny noise that never fails to get *me* to laugh, and it always works with the kids.

One young gentleman appeared wearing this t-shirt. I LOVE THIS. I love everything about it, especially the silver foil text and the font they used. I loved it so much I had to ask where they got it. You too can purchase Gangster Wrapper at Target. Sadly it is not available in my size but you can bet if it were, I would have ordered it on the spot for next weeks Christmas T-shirts.

This one I found quite hilarious and it appeared in my queue of people at the exact moment I needed that laugh to get me back to the happy jolly frame of mind required. This one is just $8 at Kmart.

Just over three weeks later, my ready to be replaced Christmas nails were super long but still almost perfect. I’ve been having the Dip Nails AKA SNS done since March now and I am a believer. These babies never let me down, and I am constantly surprised at how strong they are. Some of the tasks I have to do are not particularly nail friendly but it has been months since I had so much as a crack appear, let alone any kind of breakage.

I think a mix of things = why these nails work better for me now. The nail artists have just got better and better at the SNS procedure, I started having them done right when they started learning how to do it and I believe that is what led to the occasional problem. I have also learned what tasks are likely to spell trouble – eg opening a box – and I am a lot more careful when doing those tasks.

At the moment I’m pretty amazed if I can remember my own name and where I live, I certainly have no spare thoughts to put together comments for your blogs or a decent post for this one. I do manage the occasional comment, sorry there are not more of them.

My offsider has mostly flaked out on me, I can’t rely on them to do any of the essential tasks that need to get done at this time of year, so it is all me all the time. It is a lot more work than I was expecting, but it is 100% work I am capable of and suited to. The levels of organization.. alphabetization.. I’m feeling pretty happy about it, while at the same time completely exhausted.

Today is my first full day off where I have no intentions whatsoever of dropping into work to make sure things get done, and I have some plans – hairdressing, Christmas Shopping, a nice lunch in Berry, then a stroll around a late night Christmas Shopping event. I might see if I can park the car somewhere it can be washed, too. Hopefully this might be fodder for a post next week.

Tomorrow I have another day off and I am going to do ABSOLUTELY NOTHING all day. I need a day like that, before heading back into another 5 day stint of insanity. I might see if I can manage my November wrap up post, though.

Chooks are good if perhaps inundated with treats, kitties are good. We seem to have a rodent problem. They started chewing on the coop/run as they are locked out of it at night, and that is where the food now resides.

We’ve had to put some metal capping on. We may shout ourselves an electric chair for Christmas.

This may be one of the funniest things I have seen on the interweb – not so much the photo but the text. If you haven’t seen an episode of Law & Order, SVU, it starts with –

In the criminal justice system, sexually based offenses are considered especially heinous.

In New York City, the dedicated detectives who investigate these vicious felonies are members of an elite squad known as the Special Victims Unit. These are their stories.

Somewhat oddly, back in September I started recording Law & Order SVU on the Foxtel Box after I flicked past during an episode and got interested in an ongoing storyline of one of the main characters. I’d watched a few episodes over the years but I was more a fan of the original Law & Order. I’ve seen all the Law & Order episodes many times now, though I always find them still great even if I have seen them before.

I hit record on the regular Law & Order as well, and now I have 30 episodes of each all ready to watch, when I get a spare minute. If. If I get a spare minute. :)

On my last free day before the Christmas Nightmare began, I chose a day of pampering for myself. I had a mani pedi. I got an eyebrow & leg wax. I had lunch in a cafe. I went home and got into warmer clothes because airconditioning can be cold, and drove myself to the movie theatre, where I enjoyed Bohemian Rhapsody one more time.

Oddly, the song that got stuck in my head for the next 24 hours was Hammer To Fall. Queen played that at Live Aid. In the last 20 minutes of the movie, they actually recreate the Queen set at the Live Aid concert, and by recreate I mean eerily, spookily. There is a viral video where they show just how closely they recreated it. There is also a longer version on youtube but not sure whether that will stay up long term.

Why is that odd? There are a lot of songs in the movie and some of them are more well known to me. Some of them are less well known but are quite haunting in their own way and since seeing the movie the first time they have been added to my playlist, most notably Who Wants To Live Forever and The Show Must Go On.

I grew up listening to Queen. Music was a big thing in our household. Every Saturday morning we would turn the stereo up loud and do our household chores as a family. Out of all the songs Radio Gaga was probably my favourite back in those days. These days I would have a lot of trouble picking one favourite. I pretty much love them all.

On the same day I went to see the movie for a second time, my parents were at a conference in Melbourne and Mother was considering doing exactly the same thing as I was. She did not go because it was a Gold Class cinema and she thought she would fall asleep in the comfortable chairs, given their lack of rest time recently. But she does want to see it again, and my Aunt is taking her Adelaide people to see it this weekend.

I was not the only person in my session seeing it again. From the conversations around me, several people were watching it for a second time. If you have not seen it yet, you might still have time. Get thee to the cinema!

What Queen song do you enjoy the most?

I’m struggling a bit at the moment, working with people who cannot plan anything. If I don’t take things into my own hands and make it happen, absolutely nothing happens. In a lot of cases that is fine – I don’t ask, I just do it. But in some cases, there are things I cannot do, such as hire seasonal staff.

We’re meant to have two extra staff in my area from this weekend onwards. Know how many we got? None. Zero. It is just me, and my colleague, and we are “borrowing” one of the other staff who already works there.

We will likely all be expected to put in extra time on top of our planned shifts. Ha, I say planned, like that is an actual thing. This past week I worked 14 hours I was not rostered on for.

When I do a job, I want to do it well. I like to plan. I like to plan WELL ahead of time, as far as possible in advance. The people “in charge” are more fly by the seat of their pants, it will work out, if you just cross your fingers and hope. In general I have not found that concept to be a strategy for success.

So I’m not sure what the next 5-6 weeks will bring. I am pretty sure that I won’t have a lot of time for writing posts. The posting schedule will go out the window – you may only see a Friday post once a week. It may go completely dark here. We’ll see. :)

This past weekend was the last one I will have to myself until after Christmas. Rather than clog it up with plans and going places, we spent almost all of the weekend at home, sleeping in, resting, reading, watching teevee, and watching the chickens.

Sometime on Saturday afternoon I noticed a lot of wrigglers in the pond, so we tipped all the water out. The chooks thought this was a great plan, and deeply enjoyed digging up the ground underneath, looking for bug treats.

Here is Finn, dustbathing until the white turns grey.

On Sunday afternoon, after plenty of lazing about, we suddenly decided it was time to do some jobs we’d been meaning to do for a while. I did clean out the chicken coop. For over 7 years now, the floor of the chicken coop has been covered with lino.

The lino has been deteriorating slowly, today part of it kinda gave up. It is ok, the floor is painted with many levels of undercoat and then Taubmans Endure. But I’d rather there be something between the sand and chicken poop, so next coop clean out we might have to figure out a new plan for this.

While I did that job, The Other Half did the clean out the gutters job. The chickens were gifted with the leaves and gleefully picked through them looking for bugs to eat.

Then they were given some corn on the cob, and the last bit of cabbage. Plus some blueberries. Earlier in the day they got watermelon, and the day before, egg and cucumber.

Every night since the fox attack, the chickens have been literally boarded into the enclosure each night with a piece of marine plywood. This was partially for our own comfort levels, but also because we needed to figure out a new door solution which we could rely on.. We believe we have worked it out, we have installed tracks for this door.

The trouble with this solution is they do need an adult to come and let them out in the morning. They are most unimpressed with this plan. The early bird has to sit inside and watch the worms from a distance, they cannot catch them.

Two weeks have passed, in which time the fox has not returned. We have a motion activated camera and we had a trap set up – we took the trap back today and have now moved into defense mode, with motion activated sensor lights. The only thing seen on the camera has been rats, and a one very stealthy cat.

No Spend Days

16 out of 31 days in the month were spend days. For the most part these were preparing for November & December expenses. In the lead up to Christmas we will both likely be working 5 days a week – and I might even have to do 6-7. The good thing is the shifts are relatively short – 5-6 hours – but the bad news is I will be working every single weekend while The Other Half will be working all the weekdays.

I took some surprise opportunities both to save money buying in bulk (Petbarn, Nowra Fresh, one of the Aldi trips was 9 punnets of large mushrooms) and to save future time by food prepping and freezing. I also did some Christmas shopping while I had the chance. More about these things later in the post.

My spending saboteur has now returned to Adelaide and I will be busy working, but I do have a couple more Christmas shopping things to do yet.

No Spend Goals For November

I would like to get back to 2 grocery shops maximum each month, and 2 other spend days. As we are already halfway through November, spoiler alert, I have failed the November goal before I even set it. :)

But now, for the great news –

Grocery Spending

The grocery budget for October was $620 and we came in well below that – $125.97 below. I counted the mushroom bulk buy in with the normal Aldi shopping because that is where I got them from. Part of this was using two $10 off my shops at Coles, part of this was eating out of the freezer more, part of this was a couple of meals out which we did not pay for ourselves, and I was at a conference overnight where all my food was included.

Why did I spend $3 at Woolworths? We needed pizza bases, and neither Coles or Aldi had them.

Grocery Spending Goals For November

November has 30 days = $600
Bulk food budget $100

October Thoughts

The big field mushrooms were on special for $2.99 at Aldi when I dropped in there with my Aunt to get something she needed – I had not intended to do any shopping but when I saw that, I thought maybe I could stock up, cook up, freeze up, and be set for a while. That is $1 off per punnet, so I went a bit crazy and bought 9 of them. We had a couple of hours to kill before our nails appointment that day, we went home, rinsed, chopped, cooked and drained all 9 punnets in the space of an hour.

I put them into a very large bowl and into the fridge till I could return. Later that day, The Other Half and I measured out equal amounts and put them into foodsaver bags. I now have 12 vacuum sealed bags of mushrooms which will give me mushroomy Pizza Fridays until mid-January.

We’d bought two bags of kitty litter as we were about to run out on the 20th and a few days later I got this email –

This is a super great deal for us. We’re never going to NOT need kitty litter, we have room to store it in the shed, and $70 off is nearly three of the very large bags for free. I believe we got a deal like this late last year or early this year and this is why running out came to us as a surprise because we are so used to a new bag just being there when we need it. We bought every single bag they had in stock, which was 9 if I recall correctly, and we also got a bag of chicken food to take us over $250 and get the $70 off.

We bought chicken breast in bulk and made up some more kievs, and also chicken pieces as we were running out. I may have to do pieces again this month but if so I will like to buy enough so we don’t have to do it again in 2018.

Realising that Christmas is nearly here when I saw a gift for Mother that would work, I grabbed it. I know what I am going to get for Dad, and I will also pick up some spare things in case we have some extra folks arrive on Christmas Day. I had to buy Christmas themed things for myself for work, as Christmas is a bit of a deal where I am now.

I finally ran out of hair conditioner, so I had to get some more from “The Warehouse” and they had a special deal where if I bought shampoo I got the conditioner for free.

But in good news, I got reimbursed over $150 for some former work clothes purchasing, and I won a $50 visa gift voucher at the work conference.

I had to fill up the car again. This time I had to get the more expensive fuel because the other option was not available, and I was low enough on the gauge that I didn’t want to drive anywhere else. Still, I think filling up twice in a year is pretty awesome – if I need to do it a third time that is ok, and I may need to depending on how much I can carpool to work on the upcoming days.

Something is not quite right there.. :) That is not the photo I was expecting for whippersnapper! That is a photo of what is commonly known in Australia as a “whippersnipper”

A whippersnapper = a young and inexperienced person considered to be presumptuous or overconfident.

It has been busy here this week, I have been trying to write the #yobn end of month post from October but still have not managed to finish it. So here is your Friday post on a Wednesday, and I should have a chance to finish it before Friday.